Sonos Play review

Sonos is in need of a win at the moment. The US giant isn’t in quite the same desperate need as poor old Tottenham Hotspur are at the time of writing, but it’s hard to escape the fact that the past couple of years have been a little rough for one of audio’s most recognisable names.

The company’s much-covered app update was infamously poorly received, while patchy form on the audio front – from the middling debut of the Ace over-ear headphones to the disappointing Roam 2 Bluetooth speaker – struggled to win us back around.

Now entering this tricky landscape is the Sonos Play. The brand describes the Play as a “compact portable smart speaker”, with the new model blending streaming smarts with voice control, Bluetooth powers and a built-in battery to cover as many bases as possible in a bid to give Sonos that much-needed win.

There’s a lot on the Play’s shoulders, then: the ‘Play’ name is a throwback to Sonos’ older line of superb speakers, so is this the speaker that puts Sonos back on the right track?

Price

The Sonos Play comes with a premium price tag. Still, at £299 / $299 / AU$499, it’s a good chunk cheaper than its larger Move 2 counterpart was at launch (£449 / $449 / AU$799), hovering around the same sort of territory as the Apple HomePod 2 smart speaker (£299 / $299 / AU$479) and its WiiM Sound rival (£299 / $299 / approx AU$499).

If you’re after something that’s focused purely on portability, the Award-winning, Bluetooth-only JBL Charge 6 can be yours for at most £170 / $199 / AU$200, although it doesn’t have the same extensive arsenal of features as the Sonos or its smart speaker counterparts.

Closer to the Play’s price, you can also get the much larger JBL Xtreme 4 Bluetooth portable for around £230 / $299 / AU$329.

Build & design

The Play is something of a middle child for Sonos’ established range of portable and semi-portable wireless speakers.

It’s larger than the Toblerone-esque tubes of the slimline Sonos Roam and Roam 2, and puts us in mind of a scaled-down version of the rather bulky, wide-fronted Sonos Move 2. If you’re not so familiar with the established Sonos range, imagine a decent-sized hardcover book or a scaled-down bathroom bin and you’re most of the way there.

Either way, this is a Sonos product through and through, and in general, that’s a good thing. Sonos is not known for its slipshod approach to product design, and while you might find that it tends to err on the side of rather understated, utilitarian aesthetics when designing its speakers, this is unquestionably a well made product

The speaker is weighty in-hand (1.3kg is hardly feather-light for a portable unit), with the main body comprising a wrap-around grille topped by a rubberised top section, which feeds into another rubber strip running along the backside.

That rubber top hosts four physical buttons – two for volume, one for muting/unmuting your voice assistant and a play/pause toggle – while the spine houses a Bluetooth pairing control, a microphone toggle and a large power button. You’re also furnished with a removable, but sadly not adjustable, “utility loop", which you can hook around your finger for easier carrying.

A small LED display at the front gives you various status indicators, though we’d echo our sentiments from previous Sonos models that having a larger light would make this easier to see from afar.

The Play is designed to be portable, so there’s mettle and grit hiding beneath that rather unassuming facade. The speaker boasts a very solid IP67 rating to keep it protected from dust ingress and submersion in water, with garden hose splashes and a quick dunk in our office sink seeing the Play prove its all-terrain credentials with relative ease.

Two finishes are available – black or white – though we’d mention that, while our black sample shows little signs of the rigours to which we subject it during our tests, we wonder if its pristine all-white counterpart might be more susceptible to showing stains and scuffs after a time. If you plan on taking your speaker on outdoor adventures rather than keeping it cooped up inside or going as far as the back garden, the black option might be the one to pick.

Features

It’s best to think of the Sonos Play in the same way you might regard the established Move 2: a portable speaker that can also plug into the mains and slot into your home wi-fi network and, if you wish, integrate within your Sonos multi-room system.

As such, the Play offers Bluetooth 5.3 for when you’re roaming about and just need a quick and simple wireless connection from your smartphone, with pairing swift and stable during our tests.

It also has a very healthy 24 hours of battery life from a single charge. That’s a decent number, matching the standard lifespan of the JBL Charge 6 and the Sonos Move 2, and easily outstripping the 10 or so hours you’ll get from the smaller Roam 2.

Wi-fi compatibility offers you a more comprehensive streaming suite than most standard Bluetooth speaker rivals, with the Play granting support for the likes of Spotify Connect, Apple Music, Tidal via the Sonos app, as well as AirPlay 2. There’s no playing ball with higher quality Bluetooth codecs such as aptX HD or LDAC here, but the Sonos Play is capable of streaming files up to 24-bit/48kHz from most mainstream streaming services over wi-fi.

This being a Sonos speaker, multi-room capabilities act as a major feather in the Play’s proverbial cap. Grouping the speaker together with compatible Sonos devices, such as other Plays, the larger Move 2 or the slimline Sonos Roam 2, is a simple process – you can use the app to drag devices into your preferred group, a process which we find simple, intuitive and easy to navigate.

That simple process is done via the Sonos app, which, when it works well, is in-depth, easy to use and impressively comprehensive. Our problem is that too many times during our testing, the app suffers from usability glitches, often refusing to perform basic functions without explanation. We attempt to link Absolute Radio to our Sonos account, for instance, and only on the third attempt do we achieve a successful pairing – our first two tries are thwarted by an unhelpful error message. We hope these kinks are smoothed out with a firmware update.

Charging is performed using a supplied charging dock with USB-C cable, but there’s no power adapter in the box, so you’ll need to buy one separately (£19 / $19) from Sonos if you don’t already have one. There’s a USB-C port at the back of the speaker, either for charging or to connect an external audio source like a music player or turntable via a line-in adapter.

On the subject of charging, you can use the Play like a portable power bank by simply plugging a USB-C cable and keeping your smartphone juiced up on the go.

There are further tricks to be found to make usability easier, too. You can connect twin Sonos Plays via the app or simply by using Bluetooth – pressing the play/pause button for around two seconds on your Sonos Play will group it together with the speaker that’s currently playing Bluetooth audio. That’s a handy bonus if you’ve taken a few Plays out on your adventures and need a quick and effective way of getting stereo sound without wi-fi or app access.

Speaking of twins, you even get dual voice assistant support for your Sonos speaker, with Sonos’ own voice assistant sitting alongside Amazon’s ever-clever Alexa AI. You’ll need to set up and confirm permission to use Alexa via the separate Amazon app, but once that’s done, she’s easy to summon with a quick call of “Hello Alexa”.

Sound

Sonos never divulges the power rating of its speakers, but we know that the Play sports three Class H amplifiers powering two angled tweeters and a mid-woofer driver, as well as dual force-cancelling passive radiators which aim for deep bass and minimised vibrations.

The resultant sound is impressive in many respects. The Play covers the sonic basics admirably, and while that might sound like damning with faint praise, it’s no guarantee that a speaker of this size and type can put music together as convincingly and cohesively as our test sample manages.

As we pump out a recording of Ramin Djawadi’s The King’s Arrival from the soundtrack to Game Of Thrones, the Play gives the composition an appropriately regal feel – poised, clear, controlled, and with ample muscle to spare, it’s a powerful and convincing opening salvo.

Unlike Game Of Thrones, which really went downhill as its run came to a close, the Sonos Play doesn’t suffer a disastrous drop off when we switch to something completely different. Massive Attack’s Atlas Air gives the Play a new challenge, with the speaker striking a fine balance between weighty punch and composed control as it tackles the track with a professional, capable precision.

There’s ample bass muscle, but the Play’s clear, controlled character and disciplined signature stops that lower end from spilling out all over the place – instead, it sounds taut and punchy, evidenced by the Play firmly handles those opening drum thumps on Michael Jackson’s iconic Billie Jean.

How does the Play stack up against its key rivals? When placed side by side with Apple’s five-star HomePod 2 and with both speakers playing via AirPlay, it’s clear that the Sonos Play’s clear, punchy yet precise sound contrasts with the airier and more free-flowing temperament of the HomePod 2.

The mains-powered HomePod 2 is also a little more nuanced in how it handles instrumental timbres, granting more subtlety and texture to instruments – rich violin strokes, tumbling drum fills, tinkling pianos – making for a more natural listen than the ever-so-slightly mechanical Play.

We also find that the Sonos can tend to paint music with the same brush. Capable and controlled as it sounds, we do sometimes feel as though the speaker isn’t that flexible in its delivery – whether it’s The King’s Arrival or Elvis Costello’s Veronica, everything tends to sound a little uniform no matter the genre.

Veronica is a thin, zippy recording with a character all of its own, but some of that inherent leanness is lost as the Sonos just slightly imposes its own style on Costello’s bittersweet ditty when we listen over Bluetooth.

The five-star, cheaper JBL Charge 6 may sound harder and less forgiving when also playing via Bluetooth, but it brings out the essence of various musical styles – be it Costello, Chappell Roan or Chris Cornell – with greater expressiveness and insight.

Still, our overall impressions of the Play remain positive. Whether pumping out some Gorillaz in the garden or streaming a slice of Stevie Wonder in the sitting room, its clear, confident and controlled sound is rarely a chore to listen to. We’d like it to bend and flex to accommodate different musical styles and genres more readily, but sonically, this remains an admirable effort.

Verdict

The Sonos Play has a lot going for it. It’s hugely versatile and undeniably talented, while its ability to bridge the gap between home and outdoor use potentially saves the need for buying two separate speakers. In that regard, the Play is more than capable of justifying its reasonably lofty price tag.

If you simply need a dedicated specialist – be it a purely portable pal or a static wireless smart speaker – more sonically talented rivals are available. That said, if you’re seeking a do-it-all speaker that’s as happy slotting into your multi-room set-up as it is being taken down to the seaside, the Play makes a good deal of sense.

Review published: 26th March 2026

SCORES

• Sound 4
• Build 5
• Features 5

MORE:

Read our review of the Apple HomePod 2

Also consider the Sonos Move 2

Read our JBL Charge 6 review

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